You know a really profitable business that is really anti consumer?
Gambling!
I'm not saying that apple gamble, just that revenue and pro-consumer policy does not go hand-to-hand
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Gambling!
I'm not saying that apple gamble, just that revenue and pro-consumer policy does not go hand-to-hand
We choose to do business with them because we need to.
And guess what, those fields are HEAVILY regulated by governments and laws
Gambling is restricted by law so it’s a bad example. Not to mention whatever morality is attached to it.
Anti consumer is being thrown around as if it’s a fact rather than some subjective viewpoint.
Agreed!
But I think they can still do that a more reasonable % from Devs and while giving customers more flexibility if they want it.
It's almost like you get it.. but then whoosh...
It’s almost like there was some understanding and then now you see it and now you don’t.
Everything that was mentioned facilitates society in some way except for casinos.
Not in the same way. Most people dont require a smartphone, which is a convenience. A cell phone at least a telephone is useful. A bank is not a convenience. Unless you’re farm to table a grocery store is not a convenience.
The Internet was just a "convenience" in 2001. Nowadays you'd be hard pressed to even apply for a job without access to the Internet.
Telephones, electricity, and indoor plumbing were mere conveniences in the early 20th century (heck, two of those things weren't even widely available to rural North Americans until the mid 20th century).
Society changes and adapts to technology as it evolves. The payphone is an endangered species already because it is assumed that everyone either has or has easy access to a cell phone at all times. I need my smartphone to be charged and connected to the internet when I go into my office or log into my work computer in the morning, because it serves as both my office keycard and as my MFA method. While there are workarounds to both of those things right now, that will not always be the case.
The FCC includes wireless services in its Lifeline program “to ensure that all Americans have the opportunities and security that phone service brings, including being able to connect to jobs, family and emergency service.”
| As of December 1, 2024 | Mobile Voice 1000 Minutes | Mobile Broadband Speed: 3G Usage Allowance: 4.5 GB |
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I stand corrected. It didn’t include smartphones the last time I looked, but clearly that’s been a while.
Cellular infrastructure and the internet enables what we have today. A smartphone is a convenience.
...and that cellular infrastructure is mainly used for mobile data transfer to/from smartphones. (Not calls and SMS anymore).
Because smartphones enable what we have today:
Interpersonal communications.
Secure banking transactions.
Trip planning on public transit.
Modern mobility solutions (ride sharing, cycle hire).
Etc. ...
Citation needed. Calls are still a thing. And cellular infrastructure enables all of that. Smartphones are a form factor.
All of the above can be done on other form factors that have access to the internet.
…but they aren’t in real life.
There are no masses of people planning their trips on/with public transit on notebooks.
Neither are they booking Uber rides on Desktop computers or MacBooks.
Nor are they using non-smartphones as 2nd factor authentication.
And the most popular form of (non-face-to-face) interpersonal communication is the most popular instant messenger app. On a smartphone. Not e-mail.
This is confirmed by common observation and does not need scientific citation.
They are - but they don’t enable online banking or trip planning and modern mobility solutions.
If people want to go somewhere else within the city/metropolitan region they living in, they don’t plan the route on desktop PC in advance. Neither do they use a laptop while riding public transit.
The theoretical possibility proves nothing and has little merit as an argument.
There are many theoretical substitutes for electric power as well.
We could run metro or light rail trains on steam engines, I suppose.
But we do not - because electric power has been found very ”convenient” to use.
Not strictly necessary - but convenient and efficient.
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In real life, I do my banking on my pc, authenticate on my pc, make calls in my cell phone.
Your theoretical argument holds no water. You are attempting to elevate a smartphone to the level of air, food and water.💧
Btw I plan my trips on google maps on my desktop or my tesla screen. No smartphone needed.
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No - I'm arguing it's about as necessary, "enabling" and convenient as...
...that enable many things we have today.
You authenticate your online banking without a second factor or device?
Must be in the U.S. or some other backward country that doesn't take payment security seriously.
Right now a smartphone is a "convenience" in the same way that the internet was a convenience less than 10 years ago, and there have already emerged entire industries where it is a necessity to have a working smartphone (for example, being a rideshare driver).
Yes, calls are a thing. Paper maps and single-purpose GPS units are also a thing. That doesn't change the fact that road navigation is now being done overwhelmingly more via smartphone than those other two methods combined in most parts of the developed world. It is a very wide grey line between "convenience" and "deeply ingrained part of society", to be sure, but smartphones are far closer to latter than the former.
It is the most ubiquitous form factor on the face of the Earth. So ubiquitous, in fact, that there are few (if any) places in the world where the other cellular "form factors" are seen by the vast, vast majority of people as an anachronism.
It is so ubiquitous that you could choose any city in the world that has any kind of cell service, interact with 200 adults in that city, and at least 190 of them will have a smartphone on their person at the moment you interact with them. You could do the same thing with 200 children over the age of, say, ten years old, and you'd still find at least 100 carrying a smartphone.
There are more people who own a smartphone than own a car today. That wasn't the case less than 10 years ago.
Sure. I can also call a cab on my landline telephone to drive me to a department store to buy a DVD to watch this evening. All of those things actually still exist. That doesn't change the fact that most of the world would do none of the above. Those things still exist, but that also doesn't mean that those things aren't going to disappear sometime very soon because of the technologies that are quickly replacing them.
Just as my smartphone already replaced my physical RSA fob. Nearly ten years ago.
As do I, because I prefer it. My wife, on the other hand, who does most of the banking, does it on her smartphone.
Without smartphone or token-based MFA? Brave.
Your cell phone being what form factor exactly? Now be honest.
And you are trying to demote it to a mere toy. That, and you apparently also want to pretend that human society can exist with merely air, food, and water and no infrastructure. Good luck with that.
All you really have to do is look at the evolution of the internet from a mere curiosity (early 2000's) to a mere convenience (late 2000's or even early 2010's for some people) to an absolute necessity (definitely any time after 2020, probably much earlier than that for many people) and see how the evolution of smartphones are following that same trajectory. On that same timeline, I would say that smartphones are about where the internet was on the "convenience/necessity" scale of the internet in about 2015. Maybe a bit later than that.
You want to throw around "form factor" as an argument, and then say that you basically do all your mapping on what amounts to a giant smartphone on wheels. And then you want to try to convince people that you use Google maps exclusively on your desktop computer to "plan" your trips, and that you never open the mapping app in the smartphone you carry in your pocket everyday.
Yeah, OK bud.
Not quite. A smartphone is a form factor. The internet is physical infrastructure.
That doesn’t mean it’s a necessity right up there with food and water or even electricity. The fact is it’s a convenient form factor.
But it’s still a convenience by your own words up above. I can still navigate in a standalone garmin.
Popularity is not equal to necessity.
10 years ago cell phones were in full swing. The statement might be 10 years ago more people owned cell phones than cars.
So far imo all that is concluded is that the smartphone is an amalgam that results in convenient form factor. And that convenience is why it’s popular.